california Archives

Holman Ranch – Carmel Valley, CA

September 23, 2015 by Kristin

The last stop in California after winding through the Pacific Coast Highway was an overnight stay at Holman Ranch. It’s unbelievable how driving twenty minutes can result in such a drastic change in scenery. It was shocking, really. We pulled off to the side of the road to overlook a town filled with rolling, green hills and vineyards in every direction.

We picked up our keys at the tasting room and drove down a quaint residential road to get to the ranch. As we pulled up to the entrance, we were greeted by a deer that seemed to enjoy staring at us equally as much as we enjoyed staring at her. We entered the ranch, drove through an equestrian scene of horse stables and a jumping arena, and arrived at Guest Room #08, our home for the night.

We settled in and freshened up before meeting with Holman Ranch’s Nick Adams for a tour through the closest vineyard and the winery. Nick’s family is the fourth to take ownership of the ranch since its opening in the 1920s. And although many updates have been made to the property, Nick pointed out that his family has taken special care to maintain the historic integrity of the site, whether it be through re-using the existing barrel roof tiles when re-roofing the hacienda {as fragile as they may be} or restoring the large, exposed wood beams at the ceiling rather than replacing.

And since I’m construction gal by day {and a LEED AP!}, I couldn’t have perked up more when Nick began talking about Holman Ranch’s farming practices and how they are a SIP {Sustainably in Practice} certified vineyard. Simplified immensely, SIP certification verifies the farmer meets minimum water and energy conservation standards, upholds water and air quality standards, and uses organic pest control measures.

I was pleased, but not surprised, to find out that all of the wine we’d be drinking throughout the evening would also be certified organic wine. Not just wine made with organic grapes, organic wines are free of chemicals from farming through production. That means no sulfites either!

Nick went on further to define the style of their wine as old world and un-messed with, contrary to most California wines that are notoriously over-produced. I felt an immediate fondness to the phrase un-messed with as it aligns so well with my food philosophy.

This was the first winery tour where we given the opportunity to sample wines in various stages of the fermentation process. I especially enjoyed tasting an early sparkling wine at a time when its acid content was extremely high. Tart as tart could be, I could not drink more than a few sips. But it was an interesting experience, nonetheless.

My favorite {for real} wine of the evening was the chardonnay. Shocked because I’m not typically a white wine drinker {unless it’s a blanc}, I was really impressed with this wine’s crispness and subtle hint of pear {which I recognized only after another guest pointed it out}.

Unfortunately, I had a flight out of LAX the next day and didn’t have much time to take advantage of every amenity the ranch had to offer. I did, however, have time to send a picture of the conference room to my boss and ask if we could have our next strategic planning meeting at Holman Ranch {an event that the ranch is perfectly equipped for}!

Disclosure: Although Holman Ranch kindly hosted us, the opinions in this post are completely my own and based on my experience.

Pacific Coast Highway Road Trip

September 18, 2015 by Kristin

After a night at Lucia Lodge, we ate a quick continental breakfast and packed up the car – it was time for more Pacific Coast Highway road trip! We lasted about 30 minutes buckled in before having to pull over to soak it all in {again} and snap more pictures. I could have stared at this bridge for hours.

And even though I’m not one to sit still, everything about breathing in the ocean air, watching brightly colored flowers dance in the breeze, and hearing the salty Pacific rush to the shore, made stillness comfortable.

And the scale! At barely 5′-3″, feeling small is a usual feeling for me. But as I looked at the rocks beyond and my feet below, I felt an insignificance that felt… good. My surrounds were gigantic, larger than life, older than, well, dirt. Panic over missing an email? Aren’t I too small to worry about such a thing?

We hopped back in the car and headed to {if you can believe it} an even more breathtaking sight. Julia Pfeiffer Burns State Park was seriously magical. Waterfalls are kind of magical on their own, but combined with the most crystal blue water {ever}, massive cliffs, sandy beach, forest trees, palm trees – it was like all of the most stunning features of nature were plopped unfairly into one place!

This is the first time I’m sharing these photos and, already, I’ve had family and friends asking how soon I’d be ready to do it again. The answer is that I’m ready now! But fall is just full. It’s festival season in Austin {ACL & FFF!!}, mom/daughter Paris trip in October, and Christmas in Florida – another Pacific Coast Highway trip is going to have to wait until 2016.

Big Sur Vacation

September 16, 2015 by Kristin

For as long as Ariel has lived in Los Angeles, she’s wanted us to tack a Big Sur road trip on to one of my visits. But because a five-ish hour journey {in addition to a flight} seemed like craziness, it continued to be something we only dreamt about. That was until I was invited to tour a vineyard in Carmel Valley with a plus one. Naturally my West Coast bestie would be my date. And a vineyard adventure a few towns over from Big Sur was the perfect opportunity for us to realize our road trip dream.

Knowing food choices would be scarce in the mountains, we stopped at a Whole Foods in Santa Barbara to stock up on picnic fare. Wine, cheese, salami, and berries – our picnic meal was going to be better than anything even the best of restaurants could offer.

We arrived at our destination, Lucia Lodge, to find that we hit the visual jackpot. The lodge, ten of the quaintest cottages set as close to a Pacific cliff as one could imagine, was beyond adorable. And as we took in panoramic views of mountains, cliffs, ocean, and forest, we instantly felt the feeling of vacation.

We walked our cooler down a curvy trail, lined with flowering succulents, to a wrought iron table and chairs we would claim as our own for the evening. We laid out our spread, unscrewed our bottle of wine {how about that for planning head!}, and cheers-ed our wine-filled plastic cups. Dozens of pictures later, we sat down to eat, drink, be merry, and post on social media, only to find.. we were without internet.

After a few minutes of shock about how we could be in the most Instagrammable spot of our lifetimes and not be able to Instagram, we laughed, joked about being both #blessed, but truly fortunate, and took it all in.

Almost as soon as our giggling settled, we heard a noise that was reminiscent of frat boys “woo-ing”. “What is that, a whale?”, I asked jokingly. “Um yeah, it could totally be whales”, Ariel replied. She ran over to the picket fence to find that the noise was, in fact, coming from wales. Lots of wales {at least five}! And we spent the remainder of our wifi-less evening, whale watching and silly-picture-taking.

@GrubRestaurant LA

September 21, 2012 by Kristin

Over the years, more and more of my friends have headed West, which makes for both a fun and busy LA vacation. I was too jet lagged for Baily‘s 90s themed birthday party on Saturday (huge bummer!), but was thrilled to find out that we’d be able to meet for an extended, chat-filled lunch before hopping on the redeye flight to Tampa.

We took the advice of a friend and checked out Grub. As soon as we walked in, we could tell it was a place you could sit and chat for hours. The server immediately brought over a lovely little basket filled with pretzels, veggies, and dip, which was both good and bad. Good because it was so darn cute and satisfied that raging hunger that inevitably hits me the second I step inside a restaurant. Bad because it fulfilled the raging hunger and allowed Baily and I to do a crazy amount of catching up before even beginning to browse the menu. Regardless, our waiter was patient with us and I was thankful for that.

Everything on the menu appealed to me in some fashion, but the bold red letters stating “Voted Best Tuna Melt in LA!” lured me in. The tuna melt was as good as mine and Baily went with the crab cake salad. The tuna melt had a real tuna patty (no canned stuff here) and tasted like a super hearty, extra comforting grilled cheese sandwich. The pesto added that touch of herby-ness that I’m always a fan of. And it was large enough to take home leftovers that were equally as good two-ish hours later.

So, yum food and welcoming atmosphere were totally A+ in my book. But what ended up being my favorite part of the Grub experience was how social the restaurant was before and after our visit. We tweeted up a storm and they were genuinely interested in our visit and what we thought of our meals. It was so smart on their part, so twenty twelve. I dug it.

Til next time Grub folks!